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It’s not quite zucchini season yet. And what I mean by “zucchini season” is the point where you are hurling large zucchini out your car at passers by. Anything to get rid of the things.

If you really want to get rid of your zucchini this year though, what you can do is make these muffins. Then give these out. If someone has one of these bad boys, they’ll be chasing you down the street – begging for more.

I decided to not plant zucchini this year in my garden because I figure I can trade for whatever zucchini I need. And I’ll need some to make more of these as soon as possible.

Ingredients

1/2 Cup ground flax seed (optional, but if you skip it increase flour to 3 cups)

1 Cup unsalted butter, melted

1 1/4 Cup brown sugar

2 large eggs

2 Teaspoons vanilla

2 Teaspoons baking soda

1/2 Teaspoon salt

2 Teaspoons cinnamon

1 Teaspoon nutmeg

1 Cup Walnuts

2 small zucchini (or 1 large), shredded. Should be about 3 cups.

Directions

1) Melt butter and add to a bowl along with brown sugar, salt, cinnamon, vanilla, and nutmeg. Stir until combined well.

2) Add flour, baking soda and flax to the batter and stir until mixed well. Try not to over-mix the batter though.

3) Fold in shredded zucchini and walnuts.

4) Butter (or spray with nonstick spray) muffin tins.

5) Fill tins to the top with batter.

6) Bake muffins at 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes until they are lightly browned and a tester comes out clean.

7) Let cool for a few minutes before serving.

Making the Batter

This is a pretty straightforward muffin batter to make. I’ll cite the obvious that this recipe has two whole sticks of butter in it. I think you could get away with a stick and a half if you want, but I don’t really recommend it. They are perfect just like this.

The basics.

Start by melting the butter and letting it cool slightly. Then add it to a large bowl along with the sugar, salt, cinnamon, vanilla, and nutmeg. Stir this all together until the sugar is well-dissolved.

Then stir in your eggs, one at a time.

Then add your flax (if you’re using it) and flour and baking soda and stir to combine. Try not to over-mix it. Keep it nice and light.

Once your base batter is ready, stir in all of your shredded zucchini. It’ll look like a lot, but it works.

Zucchini livin’ the dream!

Then fold in your walnuts and your batter is ready for baking!

I had to force myself to stop eating this…

Baking the muffins

To prepare your muffin tins, spray them with a bit of nonstick spray or give them a very light coating of butter. I’ll give you two guesses for what I did. The first one doesn’t count.

When you fill your muffin cups for these guys, you can fill them completely up. They won’t rise as much as some muffins because of all the add-ins.

Note: If you end up with an odd number of muffins, be sure to fill any empty muffin tins with water before baking.

Fill them to the top!

Bake these guys at 350 degrees for about 25-30 minutes until they are nicely browned on top. A testing skewer should come out clean.

Let them cool for a few minutes and then either serve them warm or let them cool completely. If you have some wire racks, they work best for cooling.

About as good as zucchini gets.

You do have to be careful with these muffins though.

You might get sued for serving people something that sounds healthy (zucchini, walnuts, flax) in what is essentially a delivery system for butter and brown sugar.

Well, the story goes that it helps regulate the temp in the pan so the muffins don’t cook too fast. I’m actually not positive that it does anything though but I’ve never tried it without filling them. Could be an old wive’s tale. :)